


it goes like this

by KaMakani



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Antoine "Trip" Triplett, Barbara "Bobbi" Morse - Freeform, Canon-Typical Violence, Culturally Jewish Jemma, Developing Relationship, F/M, Falling In Love, Feminist Themes, Friendship, Grant Ward Deserved Better, Grant Ward Isn't Hydra, John Garrett - Freeform, Kara Lynn Palamas - Freeform, Leo Fitz - Freeform, No Angst, Original Character(s), Pre-Canon, Self-Indulgent, Time Skips, author just wants grant to be loved, supporting cast: - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-08-21
Updated: 2018-09-19
Packaged: 2019-06-30 07:14:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 16,181
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15746892
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KaMakani/pseuds/KaMakani
Summary: “So,” his mouth said without his permission. “Is there anyone you left back home? Maybe a boyfriend...or something?”She looked him squarely in the eye to tell him he wasn’t being smooth.“If this is a way of finding out if I’m single, I am, and if you’re trying to get me to kiss you, there’s a bit of an alley just up there.”...A very, very divergent canon, featuring feminist Grant Ward and all your favorite dead specialists! Almost entirely self-indulgent (:





	1. italy

“If a man is not willing to break patriarchal rules that say that he should never change—especially to satisfy someone else, particularly a female—then he will choose being right over being loved. He will turn away from loved ones and choose his manhood over his personhood, isolation over connectedness.”  
— bell hooks, _The Will to Change: Men, Masculinity, and Love_ (2004)

 

_Italy, 2008_

Grant often learned cities and people by wandering around and simply observing. The tourist hubs were interesting, but the chaos became routine after a while, and Grant wasn't supposed to be a tourist. He was posing himself as a native. For that, he needed to get into the city itself, not the crowds of tourists that ebbed and flowed like brightly colored, obnoxious waves over the real bones of the place.

So he would do what he did best: set out on his own and figure it out. No help, no interference, just him and the city around him. At first, Grant had felt eyes draw to him, like the inhabitants knew he was an outsider. He would tuck himself away with a cup of coffee and sunglasses and listen to the natives talk amongst themselves. He began to dress in lighter colors and fabrics, and got a different wristwatch, a bit ostentatious for his taste, but matching with several other city dwellers. When he moved to the other side of the city, he slipped easily into the neighborhood community. To the old woman downstairs he was the nice, soft-spoken young man who helped her with her groceries. The teenaged son of the baker looked up to him and had begun to style his own hair to mimic Grant’s. The men in the bar who used to tease him, “Where's your uncle, big guy? Don't you need a chaperone to make sure you don't sleep with all of Venice?” now handed him a drink and a pool cue while they regaled him with stories of their glory days.

Speaking of his “uncle,” his supervising officer John Garrett hadn’t commented on his going-early’s and coming-late’s. “As long as you're here when I need you, and you don't get anyone pregnant, I don't care,” is what he would say if Grant asked.

Garrett and the men in the bar seemed to think he went home with a daughter of one of the shop-owners around the neighborhood every night, but Grant wasn't really interested. He had slept with a college girl on a trip with her friends, and he was flirting with the granddaughter of the woman downstairs, but this was his last international tour before becoming a full-fledged specialist in the rotation, finally free from a team. He wasn't going to risk getting distracted.

One late afternoon, Grant was strolling along the canals, past the more popular tourist-y places. There were groups of young men, in their twenties, maybe, who were walking the opposite way from him, and Grant was cataloging their behaviors with interest. Something about the way they walked was more smooth and suave than the tough guy walk he had picked up in the States. It would do him well to channel a more European style since he was pretty sure they would be going to Poland next.

Grant let his eyes drift over the people in front him. The only thing that stood out was a young woman at the edge of a footbridge looking around like she wanted to make sure no one was watching her. She was pale, too pale to be a native, and was short and slight, maybe 5’4”, 110 pounds. She had plastic gloves on, and, as Grant watched inconspicuously, she crouched down to scrape some of the goo on the side of the canal into a Petri dish.

Quickly, Grant made his way up to her to try and see what she was doing. She didn't notice him at her back, so he cleared his throat and said in Italian, “You know, there's probably shit in that.”

She whirled around and tried to take a step back, almost falling into the water. Grant grabbed her arm (above her gloves) and pulled her back.

“Scusa, grazie,” she said once she was back on both feet. She laughed breathlessly and muttered in English, “You startled me.”

British, then. Her Italian accent was fair, but there was no mistaking the vowels of her English.

“Italiano?” he asked, not committing to being native or foreign. Foreign would immediately give him common ground with her, but did he want that?

She shook her head. “Non tanto.”

She was hiding the Petri dish behind her back and nervously looking around him, never at him. Ah, hell. Grant was bored, she had a secret, and Garrett wouldn’t need him until night. He might as well practice a little.

He gave her a curious half-smile. “Sorry I scared you. I just wanted to know why someone would want that slime.”

She finally met his eyes when he spoke English. Her gaze was surprisingly calculating, but she was blushing significantly.

“Oh! American?”

Grant nodded.

“I was...I’m a scientist,” she explained.

Grant raised an eyebrow, about to speak—

“A zoologist!” she exclaimed. “I have a degree in zoology and I love animals.”

“Tha—”

“My first pet was a _Danio rerio_. I was four.”

Then she physically put a hand (not the goo hand) over her mouth to stop herself from talking.

Grant was speechless for one of the first times in his life.

“That’s nice…?” he offered. He and his cover had the same reaction to her (false) info dump.

She looked more determined than frustrated. “Yes. I find it very fulfilling. If you’ll excuse me, though, I have to be somewhere.”

“Wait, wait—” _think, something to keep her here_ — “is it safe? The water or the slime or something?”

She tilted her head. “I think so. The city doesn’t get its water from here, you know.”

“Oh, yeah,” he allowed his face to get a little sheepish, and to hesitate a little on his words. “But my dog drinks from here sometimes.”

She raised her eyebrows in a strange fake gesture of simpering. “Ah, that’s...adorable. I love dogs. All animals really. I’m a zoologist.”

_Lies_ , Grant thought. At least she could have picked a fake job where she didn’t have to pretend to like something that she so clearly did not. “Are you going around to other canals to sample? I’d love to tag along.”

“Uhh,” she hesitated, clearly deciding between sticking with her lie or just cutting her losses.

“Just for my peace of mind,” he said quickly. He averted his gaze to seem more bashful. She would probably be more receptive to that kind of guy, seeing as her flustering was continuing. “And for the company.”

Unlike he expected, however, she didn’t blush in return to his comment. Her gaze wasn’t even focused on him, but rather a distant stare as she calculated something in her head.

“Well, you do know the language and geography,” she ventured. “I wouldn’t mind someone to talk to, as long as you haven’t anything I’m keeping you from.”

Grant smiled widely. “No, I think I’m right where I need to be.”

…

It turned out that “Anna,” as she introduced herself, after a painfully obvious moment where she decided which fake name to give him, talked a fair bit. It seemed partially to get her thoughts in order, partially to provide him with more facts about water sanitation than he would ever need in his life.

Grant was more than happy to let her fill the air. He was busy scoping out the neighborhood and its inhabitants. He hadn’t noticed it before, but traveling with a female companion—and an objectively attractive one at that—brought somehow more and less attention to him. More, because she caught their eyes and they then measured his attractiveness against hers and their own, but also less because no one wanted to look at the slightly slouching, intentionally forgettable man when a (objective) ray of sunshine walked in front of him.

As for her science experiments, she did seem to truthfully need to test the water in various areas of the canals. When he had asked what she was testing for, she only provided a long chemical name that made no sense to anyone without a degree in physical science.

“So what brings you here?”

“Research trip with my university,” she replied. _Lie_.

“They sent you out alone not knowing the language?” He put concern on his face, even though she was determinedly not looking at him. It helped the tone of voice, though, if he pretended thoroughly.

She scrunched up her nose absently. _Adorable—wait, what? Focus_.

“I was in a group, but they refused to leave one part of the city. I had a hunch that they were wrong, so here I am.” _Truth. Interesting..._

“Are they going to be mad to see you with a strange guy like me?”

She laughed. “Not unless you try to kill me.”

Grant stopped walking for a brief moment. _What?!_

Anna laughed again, weakly.

“But I really wouldn’t recommend that, since I have pepper spray of my own concoction and a button to automatically summon the police,” she rambled. “Not that I think you’re going to try to kill me, and we’re only in highly populated areas, it’s just—”

Caught off guard, Grant let out a genuine laugh. He was pleasantly surprised by her personality, and even more shocked that he didn’t even care that much about the secret she was hiding. She was eccentric enough to be amusing.

“I’m not offended, and you have nothing to worry about...I gotta say, you’re a pretty one-of-a-kind mind.” Her intellect was obvious, and besides, Grant had never gone for the type of girl who played herself down or pretended not to be driven.

Anna smiled at him, her eyes almost sparkling in the late sun. _Pull yourself together._

“So,” his mouth said without his permission. “Is there anyone you left back home? Maybe a boyfriend...or something?”

She looked him squarely in the eye to tell him he wasn’t being smooth.

“If this is a way of finding out if I’m single, I am, and if you’re trying to get me to kiss you, there’s a bit of an alley just up there.” She delivered her speech with a blush finally reaching her cheeks.

Grant couldn’t stop the smile spreading on his face. This woman was something else.

They made their way up the street to the little sheltered alcove and he turned to face her.

Their difference in height was more pronounced now compared to walking apart from each other, but it was so, so easy to put his hand to her cheek and lean down.

“Can I—”

“Yes—”

The kiss started soft, tender, both people finding the right angle and amount of pressure, then she cupped his jaw with her hand and brought him down forcefully. It flared hot in a second, his other hand snaking around her waist. Not to be outdone, she wrapped her arms around his neck.

“Here, up, pick me up,” she said breathlessly before diving back in.

He complied immediately, taking her weight effortlessly and gently leaning her against the wall.

The change in angle was glorious. Grant considered himself a decent kisser, but even the best kissers struggled with manufacturing the kind of chemistry that made kisses zing. This was one of the best, zing-iest kisses in his life.

He was so lost in the sensations that he ignored the tolling of the bell, or he would have, if Anna hadn’t abruptly pulled back, checked her watch, and cursed.

She looked at him, clearly disappointed, and pecked him one more time on the lips. “I’m so sorry, I have to go, I’m already late—”

He set her down gently but tilted her face for a final kiss. “Of course.”

At the end of the alley, she brushed her hair back and squared her shoulders. Half-turning, she looked at him as though trying to fix him in her memories.

“Thank you for...everything. I had a wonderful time.”

He gave her a bit of a rueful smile and patted his own hair down.

She turned and walked out to the street. No goodbyes, no exchanging of information, no promises of a later meet-up...Grant had to admit, she was the ideal romance he had needed. Now, he could focus on the mission and never see or think of her again.

…

But what kind of story would this be if it went like that?

Now, Grant was never really sure what he and Garrett had been summoned to do. The way they worked, the way he guessed Garrett liked to work, was more like mercenaries for hire than agents. They would go where he wanted, and if there were assignments there that SHIELD wanted done then they would do them. This wasn’t the normal process, but John had enough influence that this was how he had been operating for a number of years.

The situation was the same in Italy. Grant got home from a meandering walk where he almost succeeded in forgetting the minute details of the woman he had met, and Garrett was bustling around the kitchen.

“Hey, son. We’ve got work tonight. Protection detail for some top-secret team.”

Grant didn’t reply, but sat down at the counter and took the beer offered.

“We aren’t supposed to know what for, but word has it there’s a chemical weapon being stored ’round here and they brought in a couple lab techs to neutralize it. They’re geniuses, apparently, but not a day of field experience between them.” He chuckled roughly. Grant hadn’t been at the SHIELD academy all too long, but apparently the tensions between the science and operations divisions ran deep for everyone but him.

Grant prepared himself for a rather uneventful night, but dutifully checked all of his equipment and weaponry, then wordlessly packed it into a nondescript bag.

“The rendezvous is at o-dark hundred. Sharp. You’ll head down to the other side of town on the far side of the mission, where there will be a car waiting for you. You’ll pick up two of the scientists on the way to the airfield, where I’ll be with the others. Don’t be late.”

And with that, Garrett was off.

Grant waited until the clock struck ten, then headed out for the mission, with his bag slung over his shoulder.

The car was not hard to find, with its overly tinted windows. Grant got in to the passenger’s seat and stripped off his blazer to the black T-shirt underneath.

The driver, permanently wearing shades—the sun had gone down literal hours ago?—and a scowl, took off for the second pick up location.

Grant was studying Polish grammar when the car slowed outside of the shopping center to pick up the team. The crowd of cars distracted Grant, so it wasn’t until the scientists had buckled into the car to strip off their hats and glasses and they had already started moving that he glanced back to see the passengers and met intelligent, familiar eyes.

“Oh, bollocks.”

…

“Do you guys...know each other?” the other scientist asked. Grant had immediately dismissed him as boring.

The woman from the canal—and the alleyway, his brain traitorously kept reminding him—met his eyes in the mirror.

“We might have...run into each other at the Academy,” she said cautiously.

_Hmm, so that’s the direction she wants to go in_ , Grant thought.

The other scientist scoffed. He muttered to the woman, something about Operations students.

The car ride continued in such excruciating awkwardness that Grant was almost glad when they blew a tire on the edge of the city. The driver wheeled them safely to a stop, scowl still in place, and was about to get out for the spare tire when the distinct sound of gunshots cracked through the air.

Grant was up in a second, guns in both hands, pinpointing the source of the shots. Luckily, or maybe unluckily for a normal person, the shots were aimed at Grant’s side of the car, so he could shoot through his window. He aimed careful cover fire at the row of shadowy cars, while yelling to his companions.

“Get out, get to that blue car!”

A rusty, faintly blue car was close to their stranded vehicle. It was old, but Grant’s absent assessment immediately before the tire went out indicated it would finish the job. Shooting a furious barrage of gunfire, he sprinted for the car.

The male scientist was scrabbling uselessly at the handle for the passenger side door whimpering. The woman got to his side in a second and didn’t hesitate to smash in the window with a rock.

Grant had just a second to be impressed before he broke in the window to the driver’s side with his elbow and ripped his way to the wires of the car.

“Take this,” he said to the woman, who had gotten into the passenger seat. He handed her one of his guns. “Just fire in that direction as often as you can.”

Their driver had been armed and was firing out of his window in the backseat. The male scientist appeared to have collapsed in whimpers, but at least he was cradling the briefcase of their samples and data.

The woman took the gun with no hesitation and did what he asked.

_Focus, Grant, focus_ , he reminded himself before sorting through the wires.

Quickly, hearing shattering glass around him, he stripped the wires, turned on the engine, released the brake, and pealed out onto the road.

The drive to the airfield was no less exciting, as they were pursued halfway there. Finally, the driver got a good shot and gave them the space they needed.

Garrett was already there, by a lone plane on the dark airfield. He did not look impressed by the bullet-ridden clunker of a car, or the state of the lab techs.

“What the hell did you get yourself into?” he asked, and Grant knew he wasn’t mad.

He roughly helped the trembling male scientist out of the car.

“I was on time, wasn’t I?”

John cracked a smile. “You sure were, kid. And in a car like that, too.”

Grant brought the male scientist up the runway of the plane, even though he could mostly walk by himself, zombie-like. But his extra effort paid off, when the woman approached him.

“So...SHIELD agent?”

He couldn’t force a convincing smile. “Specialist training. You?”

“Science division. Dr. Jemma Simmons,” she said, offering a hand.

“Grant Ward,” he replied, taking it. The formality felt sharp, contrasting with their earlier encounter.

She smiled at him, and they started walking in their opposite directions.

Grant was in the middle of composing a speech to himself about why turning around was a bad idea, when her voice rang out again.

“Wait! Agent Ward!”

She strode down to hand him...a Petri dish cover?

“I was debating about whether to give this to you earlier today, and I decided not to...but, um, I think we have...some more things in common than I thought, and you should give me a call if you’re ever at The Hub.”

On the reverse side of the dish was a phone number written in sharpie.

He grinned at her helplessly, and she mirrored him.

For a heartbeat, he forgot they were standing on the runway of a plane owned by the international security organization they both worked for. He was just a guy, she was just a girl he had seen on the vacation of a lifetime scooping shit out of a canal.

The moment shattered as the plane’s engine started up. Grant retreated to Garrett’s side, who was looking at him with amusement, but also some amount of reproach in his eyes.

“If you’re all done with your little moment, we still have to clean up this whole thing,” he said as they watched the plane prepare for departure.

Grant was saved from having to respond by the deafening sounds of the jet engines as the plane began to move down the runway. They watched in silence, leaning on the hood of the beat-up old car Grant had commandeered.

After the plane had reached the sky and the roar had quieted to a dull ache, John clapped his hands together and nodded like he had come to a decision.

“Let’s get to work, lover boy. I didn’t waste all that time training you to lose you to some tramp.”

Garrett had always talked like that, disdainful of love and all those “mushy” feelings. A day ago, Grant would have said it didn’t bother him, but now, he found himself feeling sorry that his S.O. didn’t understand the thrill of meeting someone interesting and beautiful enough to distract him from the bodies they were undoubtedly going to have to bury that night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I messed with some timing and made up how SHIELD works. In my head, Jemma is maybe 19 or 20 and Grant a few years older than that. They’re very young;; war is hell.


	2. sci-tech

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Tell me about your happiest moment."

It was another three months before Grant had the chance to use the number on the Petri dish, which he memorized and threw into his bag. Specialists didn’t really have the luxury of intact sentimental objects, but he couldn’t bring himself to destroy it completely.

He and Garrett had indeed gone to Poland next, where they dismantled an advanced bomb-making factory run by a mad scientist. Grant had been in charge of diffusing and sending all the bombs back for studying, since they were years ahead of what he had seen from SHIELD.

The next two months were similarly spent crisscrossing the globe doing various missions. Notably, Grant had to take a brief detour to do an assignment in the Sicilian mob, which was a fun workout.

Then a welcome message was sent to John from the Academy. SHIELD, in their biennial symposium for recent graduates, wanted Grant to do a presentation on the various bombs he had found and disarmed in Poland, and then a demonstration with a look-alike model for students wanting to specialize in bomb disposal.

Grant was never one to look forward to teaching, especially not to a room full of kids all itching to show everyone else they were the best, but he was convinced when he received the schedule of lectures and saw Dr. Jemma Simmons was presenting on nanosurgery.

He pulled out his phone and texted the number he had had in his brain since she had first given it to him.

_GW: Any chance we can wander around the downtown then get shot at in a car chase after the symposium?_

It definitely wasn’t the smoothest line he had ever opened with, but the point was to be memorable and not just throw some half-assed “Hi, this is Agent Ward, that one guy from that one place that hasn’t called till now.”

She responded fairly quickly, assuaging the nerves that may or may not have been fluttering in his gut.

_JS: I’m going to have to refuse that, but I would happy to have dinner instead!_

Grant responded in the affirmative, then dropped his phone and grinned up at the ceiling, counting down the days until he left for the States.

 

…

 

Jemma’s lecture was the day before Grant’s, so he gave Garrett the excuse that he wanted to see the models he would demonstrate on a day early. He had no doubt that the SHIELD techs had built a perfectly fine model, and if not, he trusted himself to turn it around into a teaching moment, but John seemed to believe it enough.

Since the car chase in Italy, Garrett had distanced himself a little from Grant. It made sense, knowing Garrett’s strict policy against feelings or sympathy of any kind, but Grant was feeling a bit of strain at losing who he considered a father figure. But the more Garrett stopped treating him like a son, the more Grant realized that Garrett wasn’t a very upstanding guy. Not that that was always a dealbreaker, especially in a profession like theirs, but it made Grant want his promotion to a full, independent specialist even more.

In the lecture hall, Grant was easily the most muscled, imposing person, so he lurked around the back in the shadows. He didn’t understand 90% of the words on her slides, but it didn’t matter because she had spotted him as he entered the room. She gave him a little smile and texted him to meet her in the backroom after she had answered questions.

He loitered after her talk was over, anticipating the crowd of admirers rushing the stage when she finished. He occupied himself by looking at the framed photos on the wall (supposedly) of a mutant virus that SHIELD scientists found a cure for when everyone else in the world was stumped. It just looked like colored blobs to Grant.

Strolling to the back room, which was behind an unmarked door, but Grant was nothing if not curious and determined, he was greeted to a remarkable sight. The back room served as offices for several full-time professors, and the entire back wall was covered in bookshelves, with papers sticking out haphazardly. The rest of the room seemed to match the more tech-based methods Grant would have predicted of SHIELD scientists: computer screens, hologram docks, and unfinished models of strange pieces of metal that Grant could picture in a modern art museum.

Finally, Jemma made it into the room. She was slightly breathless.

“Hi,” she said, approaching him.

“Hi.”

There was a moment of tension, neither really knowing how to greet the other, and instead just standing there.

Jemma shrugged, pulling a face at their mutual discomfort, and tugged the elastic holding her hair out to re-do it.

“Can I still interest you with dinner?” she asked.

“I booked a reservation at the Vineyard for eight. I’ll pick you up at 7:30?”

“Oh, that’s a rather posh place, isn’t it? I’ve never been.”

“Me neither. But I doubt they’d kick us out if we showed up in casual clothes.”

“I should still stop by my flat to change before. I’ll text you the address.”

“Okay. 7:30?”

“7:30.”

 

...

 

Grant decided on a button-up, slacks, and no tie. He knew he had made the right decision when Jemma got into the car in a pantsuit that complemented her creamy skin.

“Agent,” she greeted with a smile. Her hair was down, curling faintly around her jaw and cheekbones. _Adorable_.

“Doctor.”

The ride seemed to fly by. Grant had a rare feeling of...butterflies in his stomach? Which was odd, considering his chosen career occasionally involved seducing marks. First dates were normally child’s play for him. A part of his brain kept taunting that there was a reason for his sudden nerves, but he didn’t dare listen too closely to that.

They were seated in the corner of the second dining room. The din of other guests still reached them, but the lighting was very dim, intimate. Grant pulled out her chair for her, and seated himself with his back to the wall.

Jemma looked over her menu at him. “So, I read about your talk in the list of graduates. Is bomb tech a speciality of yours?”

“Kind of. I’m mostly combat, but it’s a good skill to have.”

“I look forward to hearing your lecture, then,” she said, setting down her menu.

“You’re going?” he asked.

She nodded. “A colleague of mine is a top engineer who’d benefit from hearing it, but I doubt he’ll go unless I take him with me.”

Grant shifted closer towards her. “Is the rivalry that bad?”

“Oh, yes. Everyone’s quite intense there. I’m surprised you aren’t more involved—Operations students are usually so sensitive about their weaknesses.”

Grant cracked a grin. She was testing him to see if he fit her preconceptions of brooding Ops students. Luckily, he didn’t actually have much skin in the game.

“It never really bugged me, I guess. I was only there for a little while, and everyone annoyed me pretty equally.”

“Spoken like a true lone wolf specialist,” she said in a lowered voice.

Grant allowed himself a moment to smirk and skim the menu.

“Your research in nanotech is...groundbreaking, to say the least. I had no idea you guys could do all that stuff with bone marrow and stem cells.”

Jemma laughed. “Thank you. I wasn’t quite sure you were listening, to be honest. I know it can get a bit technical, more meant for students with a couple PhD’s.”

Grant shrugged. This was interesting territory: how should he present his self-esteem and sensitivity to not being the best?

“I got the gist of it. And from there it’s easy to see the practical applications in what I do, like broken bones, retrieving shrapnel…”

“Exactly! While I’m obviously more invested in research for the sake of knowledge, I’ve always been a bit confused on why the rivalry exists when our ultimate career goals are to help each other. The science division brings in new tech and medicine, Ops uses it to keep the world stable and open to our new science, and then it just keeps cycling around.”

She paused while they ordered appetizers.

“We’d all be a bit less idiotic if we let our worlds overlap,” she finished.

Grant smiled and laid his hand on hers where it was resting on the table invitingly. “You might be onto something there, Dr. Simmons.”

She turned her hand to lace their fingers together. “Agent Ward, I quite agree.”

 

…

 

Dinner ended after an evening of pleasant conversation and good food. Grant showed more of himself than he normally would, around dates or even John. The first time he had said a rather sarcastic remark, instead of getting offended like he had feared, Jemma had shot back an equally cutting response and they had gone from there. He shouldn’t have been surprised that she was witty and a lightning-fast thinker.

When the bill came, Grant pushed to pay it. He expected Jemma to fight for a half-half split, and she did, but gave up much earlier than anticipated to say, “Well, all right, you can pay this time if you let me buy you dinner next time.”

Grant happily agreed, though he had definitely thought he would be the one to seduce her smoothly into another date.

The good feelings and banter continued until they reached Jemma’s apartment. Grant hadn’t given hints that he wanted this night to end with sex, since he had to work with her and Fitz the next day and didn’t want it to be unduly complicated. But he was still a little disappointed when she leaned over the gearshift to kiss him, whisper goodnight, and slip out of the car.

This didn’t put in the dent in the bubbly feeling Grant had from a date gone well. The weirdest part was, he hadn’t put on a whole lot of a fake identity. She seemed to have genuinely liked him, under the brooding face and intimidating set of his shoulders and instinctual sarcasm.

 _She doesn’t really know you_ , a voice said in his head. _You think she’ll ever trust a guy who lies for a living? A monster? A killer?_

 _Who gives a damn about that?_ Grant told the voice fiercely. _She knows what I do, she’s seen me work, she’s shot my gun and broken into a car with me; she knows enough, and she still chose to be with me…._

_She chose me._

 

…

 

Grant’s lecture about the Warsaw bombs went about as well as he expected. The hall was full of bright young Ops students showing off for each other and sizing him up unabashedly. The good part was that he didn’t have to look at the audience very often, since he was handling the models and diagrams projected on the massive screen behind him.

The flip side of this was that he didn’t find Jemma in the crowd, not that it would have changed how he felt towards lecturing and teaching.

After he had finished, there were a few people who dared to approach him despite the body language strongly suggesting not to. He answered a handful of questions by telling them to ask one of their teachers, then excused himself.

Jemma and her colleague, presumably, were waiting in the backroom like the day before. Different backroom, eerily similar contents.

“You did very well considering you looked like you would prefer to detonate the bombs rather than answer audience questions,” she said teasingly.

Her companion gave her an incredulous look, which belatedly made Grant realize that he still had a don’t-talk-to-me expression on. He tried to relax and stop looming.

“It’s a good thing only a few of them tried,” he said, tone failing to match the lightness of her statement.

Jemma’s colleague looked increasingly uncomfortable.

“This is Dr. Fitz,” Jemma said, unsubtly pushing him closer to Grant.

Fitz, and Grant had to give him credit for this when he looked like he would rather chop his arm off, stuck a hand out brusquely.

“Agent Ward,” he said, not looking in Grant’s eyes.

“Dr. Fitz.”

“Fitz engineers weapons and equipment, and he’s looking to expand into bombs,” Jemma supplied, correctly guessing that neither of her companions would attempt conversation.

“I can already build the bombs, I just want to incorporate some of the systems of multiple pathways of detonation from the Warsaw bombs into a couple of the current SHIELD models,” Fitz said.

Jemma nudged him with her elbow.

Fitz sighed, shuffled his foot on the floor, then finally met Grant’s eyes. “Your...experience could be helpful.”

He risked a look at Jemma’s face, which Grant could tell even from his angle was exasperated.

“...Please.” Fitz added belatedly.

Grant thought that was pretty funny internally, but stopped as soon as Jemma’s gaze turned to him. _Respond_ , screamed her expression.

“I could talk to my S.O., see if I can spend another day here,” Grant offered grudgingly.

Jemma beamed. “Lovely! Fitz’s email is in the directory.”

Fitz gave Grant a nod, and turned to go. He stopped when he realized Jemma wasn’t leaving with him.

“Simmons?”

Jemma, who was still smiling softly at Grant, whirled around to face him.

“Oh, sorry, Fitz. I have to beg off movie night. I owe Agent Ward here a dinner.”

For a split second, Grant thought Fitz was going to vomit.

“You—wha—him?” Fitz finally got out.

Jemma looked at him, and he looked at her. Grant was pretty sure they were communicating with their blinks.

With a final grumble, Fitz headed for the exit again, raising a hand vaguely in a wave.

“Oh, dear,” Jemma sighed.

“He’s jealous,” Grant said, mentally slapping himself in the forehead after. _Great job not sounding jealous yourself, idiot_.

Jemma gave him a searching look. “He’s my best friend, but it’s not like that. Obviously.”

She blushed after that last part, which seemed to have been accidentally said, and busied herself with fixing her coat.

 _Adorable_ , Grant thought. Then, _Shut up_.

“I’m glad.”

The shy smile when she heard that was worth all of his internal wrestling with himself. God, he was in deep.

They started walking towards the exit to outside of the Academy.

“I was thinking: you probably haven’t had a home-cooked meal in awhile, traveling around so much. And your S.O. doesn’t seem the type to encourage it. I have a clean kitchen and the ingredients for pasta, if you wouldn’t mind that.”

Grant had to clear his throat suddenly. God, when was the last time he had wanted to make a meal for himself to enjoy? “That sounds great. And you’re right, Garrett would probably flip out if I tried to serve dinner. We basically exist on takeout and only use our bases for sleeping in.”

“Do you have a permanent home here in the States?”

Grant knew the logical path of the conversation would turn to family, so he decided to just get in front of it. And to refuse his immediate instinct to lie about that. _You like this girl_ , his higher brain hissed.

“Kind of. I have an apartment that I’ve spent almost no time in. I don’t even think there’s furniture.”

Here he had to take a breath. Jemma, walking beside him, made no attempts to interrupt him.

“My family...we didn’t have the best relationship. I haven’t spoken to any of them since I was fifteen. My only connection to them is one of my covers, but other than that, I’m dead to them.”

Jemma reached out to grab his hand, which was clenched into a fist. She waited until he relaxed before slotting her fingers in between his.

“I’m sorry, Grant. I—I shouldn’t have pushed—”

“No, no, it’s fine. It was one of the best decisions I’ve made, and I wouldn’t be the person I am now without that.”

Looking to lighten up the mood, he joked, “I forget that outside of specialist work most people have family connections. A lot of agents I hear about were orphaned, or mysteriously just popped into the world as fully-grown spies.”

Jemma didn’t laugh, but the mood was marginally less somber.

“I wish I could say I was surprised.”

“What about you, your family?”

Jemma waited until a group of people passed them until she replied.

“My parents have been supportive, but they also don’t really know what I do. I’m not sure my family even knows what SHIELD does. That’s why it was a nice surprise when I found out you were an agent—less tedious explaining, less fear of you walking out because you’re afraid of strong, independent women….”

“Oh, believe me, I would not want to go up against the top female agents. They are terrifying.”

They walked in silence for a block, gently swinging their joined hands between them.

“If you’ve been lying to your parents for so long, how are you still so bad at it?”

She groaned good-naturedly. “I know, it’s pitiful. I just get so flustered, and I can’t think of lies on the fly. It’s a wonder they aren’t more suspicious. Maybe they’re smart enough to know not to look further.”

They reached her apartment a little bit later. Jemma’s kitchen wasn’t very big, but it was well-lit and she had all of the ingredients as promised.

Jemma started the water, and she and Grant stood side-by-side to chop the fixings for the sauce.

“Tell me about your happiest moment,” she said out of the blue.

Grant was always on-guard by nature, but he had to admit that the cozy kitchen, the bubbling water, the quiet music playing, and the glowing woman beside him was relaxing him. Some part of him, the soft part that had almost been burnt and beaten out of him, was unfurling. _Let her in_ , that part of his mind whispered.

“Probably the day I broke the combat score record at the Academy.”

He concentrated on his chopping instead of looking at her.

“In Ops, there’s a lot of prestige based around who wrote your recommendation or who’s scouting you for their team. I was a nobody and I joined late, so I was written off from the beginning. Then I fought the entire graduating class, and my own class, and I was virtually undefeated. And suddenly, everyone was trying to get on my good side. It was the most liked—or least hated—I’ve ever been in my life, and it was terrible. Couldn’t be left alone.”

Jemma put down her knife. “I’m going to hug you now.”

Bemused, Grant put his down too—he had chopped the parsley almost to the point of powder—and accepted her hug.

It was a quiet, warm moment. Grant wasn’t entirely sure what prompted that reaction. His story had been pretty factual, kind of violent—he hadn’t been trying to tell her a sob story.

“Hey,” Jemma said, pulling back and looking directly into his eyes. “I like you plenty, with or without the combat score.”

“Yeah?” he croaked. This conversation felt weirdly off-kilter, like it was following a whole other path that Grant couldn’t have predicted. It wasn’t...bad? He should have expected that Jemma would throw his ideas on human behavior off, considering she had been doing that since she had warned him against murdering her.

Jemma withdrew from his arms and turned back to her chopping.

“Fair’s fair; you get to ask me something now,” she said lightly, clearly moving on from the moment that was perplexing Grant.

“Uh, okay. What about you—your happiest moment?”

“I’ll answer it this time, but next time ask me a different question! Otherwise it’s just me stuck coming up with them.”

Grant smiled and agreed. The moment was still confusing, but it was also comforting him. It was like a brief dip into the closeness that he imagined more-fortunate people had from a young age.

“When I was fifteen, I was given the opportunity to present my research at a conference of top biotech scientists. It went pretty well, considering I’ve never been the best at teaching or public speaking—I’d much rather stay in my lab—and afterwards, Dr. Jennifer Doudna, a brilliant scientist who revolutionized genetic engineering, came up to shake my hand, and asked to buy me a coffee and pick my brain about a certain abnormality she had run into in her work involving HIV-positive cells. I guess, it was just...the moment I felt accepted in the larger scientific community. I finally started publishing under my own name, whereas before I used a pseudonym so no one discarded it simply because I was young.”

“Jem—that’s amazing,” Grant said. It was his turn to put down the knife. “They were idiots not to respect your genius.”

They shared smiles, until Jemma realized their water was boiling over.

After calming the pasta and adding the thoroughly chopped sauce ingredients, they sat down to share a bottle of wine.

“If you could have dinner with anyone, alive or dead, who would it be?”

And they were off, off into the time-intensive process of bringing their worlds a little closer.

 

…

 

After polishing off the pasta and the bottle or so of wine, and sharing an amount of information about themselves that Grant resolutely avoided agonizing over, they ended up cuddling on the couch.

“It’s late,” Grant said quietly. “I should go.”

Jemma’s head lay on his chest. She could no doubt feel his heartbeat, but that vulnerability didn’t seem to matter to him anymore.

“If that’s what you want,” she said with a yawn.

“...What do you want?”

She shifted up and around to look him in the eyes. Grant noted that even after the food, wine, and fairly intimate conversation, there was still a sharp intelligence in her gaze.

“I want you to do what you’re comfortable with,” she said, which, as Grant was beginning to see, was something not many people, and certainly not himself, had considered in any decisions about his life. “There’s room for you here.”

Suddenly, Grant saw the trajectory of his life if he hadn’t met her; he worked and worked until he one day died, and left not a single person who actually cared about him. In another time in his life, this would have been what he wanted—no one to carry on the messed-up Ward line, no one for him to hurt with his anger and pain. But now...that also meant he died alone and bitter, which was exactly what his family wanted. Why shouldn’t he be allowed to change? Why shouldn’t he be allowed to be happy?

This sparked something of an epiphany in him, or possibly a panic attack. This woman had burst into his life out of nowhere and figuratively woken him up. She was the first person to value him for who he was, instead of what he could do for them, and she provoked the same in him. She wanted him to be safe, comfortable, capable of making his own choices.

“I’d be happy to stay,” he whispered into her hair.

She smiled and untangled their limbs from each other. “Good.”

Then she offered her hand out for him to take as he stood up from the couch. In that moment, with her kind, lovely face dimly lit by the lamp in the corner and a small shirt stain from the pasta they had made and eaten together, she was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen.

He took her hand.


	3. sci-tech

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “So…”
> 
> “So,” Grant parroted with a little smile.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know nothing about bombs or bomb construction but I have an active imagination and nothing to lose by spouting a whole lot of bs, so...enjoy?

Grant awoke at his usual early hour. Jemma was still soundly asleep, curled up next to him, but luckily not on him, so it was easy to extricate himself and head to the bathroom.

He had known that his workout routine would be disrupted while at the Academy, but a run would be a good way to wake up. And, as per usual, he had a few spare changes of clothes in his bag. Not because he had expected to be staying over—he hadn’t assumed anything—just because the paranoia built into him wasn’t easy to ignore. He scrawled a quick note to Jemma and taped it gently on her hand.

The area around Sci-Tech was something of a college town, if college towns were usually inhabited by prodigies and legendary SHIELD figures. Jemma’s apartment complex was one of many, but the streets were strangely empty. Grant would have thought at least a couple early-rising Ops kids would be out and about.

He returned after working up a good sweat and petting a dog that someone had been walking—finally, at around 5 am, when he had finally seen life in the town—to find Jemma at the kitchen counter.

There was a kettle boiling on the stove beside her, and she was skimming through an obnoxiously large tome like it was a novel. She looked up as he came in.

“Good morning.”

“Morning.” After a moment’s hesitation, he dropped a kiss on her mouth.

“Can I use your shower?”

“Of course. Towels are in the closet. Would you like tea or coffee?”

“Whatever you’re having.”

They shared the tea and a bit of breakfast quietly. Grant was reading the mission briefing Garrett had sent him, and Jemma continued with her monster of a textbook, which she was now casually taking notes on.

Grant kept looking at Jemma wondering if this was how morning-afters without sex were supposed to be. He knew he was fitting a stereotype, but he had never _not_ had sex with a romantic partner and stayed the night. Jemma would occasionally glance at him too, but whenever they caught each other, they just smiled. Grant had a hard time understanding the feeling rising in his chest; eventually, he settled on _contentment_.

He wandered over to where she was still leaning on the counter, half-eaten breakfast beside her.

“What are you reading?”

She looked up after a moment.

“An old standard on the history of tumorigenesis radiation in oncology research. It’s a bit dry.”

Grant quirked his eyebrows up in amusement.

“Oh, hush. Very dry. What about you? What do you have?”

He sighed and pocketed his phone.

“Mission briefing. I fly out to meet Garrett tomorrow.”

“Can I ask what the mission is?”

“Technically I can’t tell you. But it’s not going to be dangerous. It’s just time-sensitive, so I can’t stay longer.”

“Ah,” she said. Grant hoped he wasn’t making up the disappointment in her voice.

Her phone lit up on the counter.

“It’s Fitz,” she relayed to him. “He just got to the engineering storage room and is bringing out a couple models to show you.”

“Starts early,” Grant commented.

“And we didn’t?” she teased.

Grant had gotten back just after 5 am, and Jemma had already been wide awake. He had the feeling that if he hadn’t been there, she would have gone to work as early as she could have.

“I got your note.”

His hand was fidgeting lightly and he forced himself to stop.

“Oh. Yeah. I didn’t want—I mean, even though—uh.” He took a breath. She was still just sipping her second cup of tea waiting for him to get the words out. “I didn’t want you to think that I had just left.”

She drained her tea and put it in the sink.

“Well, I appreciated it. That was the best I’ve slept in a while.”

Grant made an inquisitive noise.

“I’ve never been very good at keeping a healthy sleep schedule. I know how important it is, and all the science and everything, but I’m always up reading late or waking up in the middle of the night with a breakthrough.”

“Yeah, I’m similar. Well, not the scientific part, but I’ve been sleeping late and waking up early my whole life. Don’t know if I’ve ever gotten the, what, seven hours you’re supposed to have?”

“Then it’s a good thing we’re sleeping togethe—oh, no, stop laughing, that’s not what I meant!”

She flicked water at him from where she was washing her cup at the sink.

Grant could only grin.

 

…

 

Eventually they made their way to the labs on the science side of the Academy. Jemma and Fitz were somewhat celebrities, so they had been given all the latest and best equipment in a private room.

Until early afternoon, Grant and Fitz deconstructed and reconstructed various systems of detonation. The Warsaw bombs had a record number of failsafes that had to be deactivated in a particular order, which is what Fitz was outfitting a handful of SHIELD bombs with.

“See, here they used a Fujiyama release mechanism, but they made it look like a run-of-the-mill Kissinger. I’m going to fashion a hybrid between that and a Yorkshire corkscrew over the Fujiyama release, so that the activation spark is much more immediate and consistent,” Fitz said. His natural tone when addressing Grant was condescending, but Grant was beginning to think he was not at all alone in that respect.

“The point of the Kissinger is that whoever is trying to neutralize the bomb cuts the wires at the same time and sets off the release unknowingly. It was only because I noticed the Fujiyama underneath that I didn’t blow the whole factory up.”

Fitz didn’t reply, but he had his thinking face on that Grant had learned before with Jemma should just be given space.

“What about a two-lead Kissinger?” he suddenly said.

“Over the Fujiyama? But that would—”

“Agitate the countdown,” they said at the same time.

Fitz held up a finger. He looked excited, or at least as close to smiling as he had ever been in Grant’s presence.

“But what if the countdown was in a Lefevre coil?”

“That’s..,” _genius_ , Grant almost said, but instead went with, “That could work.”.

Fitz gave him a triumphant smirk like he knew what Grant had bitten back, but it didn’t matter because Jemma lit up at her exhaust hood across the room, working on her own experiments. She gave Grant a blinding grin.

Fitz was moving on. These SHIELD scientists were always bustling around. “I’ll work that into the model on the KRP-09. Prasaad will probably want someone to teach the Ops students in simple language they can understand, if you’re going to be here tomorrow.”

“I won’t be. But there’s plenty of other bomb disposal agents.”

And that seemed to be the end of the conversation.

Grant turned to Jemma’s side of the room. She had put down her various beakers so he felt better about approaching her.

“I’m going to head out, try to get some work done. Dinner later?” he asked, gathering his bag from a hook by the door.

“I’ll be done in about four hours. Just let me know where you are then and we can walk to my flat.”

He nodded and leaned down to kiss her. She reciprocated, but kept her gloved hands away from their bodies.

“Contamination,” she said, wiggling her hands for emphasis.

“Oh, for God’s sake,” Fitz muttered from the other end of the room.

 

…

 

For dinner, Jemma surprised him with a shopping bag full of ingredients for them to make another meal. There was chicken, various veggies, and a bottle of wine (of course).

“How’d you buy this?” Grant asked, holding up the wine. “Aren’t you turning 21 in September?”

She scoffed. “This country and your silly age laws. I have a fake ID, even though it would be legal in literally any other country for me to buy alcohol at 20. And how do you know when my birthday is?”

“You have a fake?”

“Darling, I don’t know if you’ve realized this, but the Academy would probably bring us a keg of beer if I asked for it,” she stated matter-of-factly. “I just mentioned it and they gave me a fake passport as a ‘safety precaution’ in case I was being followed or something, which would never happen; it’s just a veiled way of allowing me to buy alcohol.”

Grant was delighted by this development. “Dr. Simmons, I am floored. A member of an international security agency breaking the sacred law—”

Jemma yanked the wine out of his hand. “Just for that, you’re not getting any! And you still haven’t answered my question.”

“I was listening,” he said, backing away with his hands up. “You told me the story about the teen discount at that water park you took your cousins to, and that they wouldn’t let you pay the cheaper price even though it was the day after your 20th birthday.”

Jemma was standing stock-still looking at him.

“What?” he asked, bewildered.

“No, it’s just...I’ve just realized my past romantic partners have been right pricks compared to you. None of them listened to me, or, at least, not my stories about my baby cousins.”

“That’s probably the espionage training, but I’ll take it. You deserve better than people who don’t listen to you.”

She handed him the wine back as a peace offering. “While you may have a point with the spy bit, I’m willing to bet it’s just you as a person.”

 

…

 

Once they had eaten, and their dishes washed and put on the rack to dry, Jemma faced him thoughtfully while drying her hands on a towel.

Grant let her study him, not letting himself fidget like his original reflex wanted to.

It felt strangely expected, like coming home at the end of the day, when she took his hand and led him to her bedroom. The atmosphere was different from when he had last been there, that morning, intimate in a distinct way.

“Do you mind if I take this off?” she said quietly, toying with the bottom of his shirt.

They undressed each other slowly, with whispered questions and subsequent assurances, until Grant was kneeling on her bed with her laying spread on her back in front of him. _Beautiful_ , came the thought, unbidden, to his mind.

There wasn’t a lack of passion in the room, but it was a quiet fire. It was more like everything they did was inevitable, familiar, always welcome.

Grant moved to rest over her body, putting them face to face.

“Hi,” he whispered.

She grinned. “Hi,” she whispered back before kissing him gently.

“I don’t—do you mind—I wanted to use my mouth,” he said, “but I want to be able to kiss you here.”

After a few more traded kisses, she said, “It’s okay. Stay here. Next time.”

Giving in to the want crawling up his throat, Grant leaned more fully on her and followed her directions.

 

…

 

The morning, which began early for both of them, started with a workout that was quickly becoming one of Grant’s favorite activities. The main difference, Grant decided, from his other encounters was the lack of desperation. Most of the people he had slept with in the past were a one-time or two-time event, fueled by adrenaline or anger or sadness or alcohol and always tinged with the knowledge that this was the only opportunity to be together. With Jemma, though, it felt more like the possibilities were just opening up.

Then came showering, which took them embarrassingly long, but they had time, being the early-risers they were. They shared more tea, more stories and strange questions, and Grant could feel himself dreading the thought of leaving.

The rising sun lit upon Grant’s single duffel bag against the wall of Jemma’s apartment, and it seemed to grow in size until they couldn’t ignore it anymore. It was only very close to when he had to leave that they talked about...it? Them?

“So…”

“So,” Grant parroted with a little smile.

“Any idea when you’d be done with your march across Europe?”

Grant leaned casually against the wall. “I have a few more months—two or three, I think—of shadowing Garrett, and then I get added to the specialist rotation. After that, who knows?”

Jemma’s face fell, but she did an admirable job covering it up.

“I’m—I didn’t mean it like that,” he said into the silence. “But it’s something that’s not going away any time soon. I’ve spent my whole life training for this job.”

“I wouldn’t—I couldn’t—ask you to give that up,” Jemma assured him. “I suppose I just want to know if this’d be worth it, to...try.”

Grant left his wall and walked over to take her hands in his.

“I don’t know,” he said truthfully. “I have my job, you have yours, and it comes with that that we can’t always put our relationships first. Especially not coming up, since I’m new to the rotation…but I can tell you that this is the first time I’ve wanted to try.”

Jemma moved forward to put her face in his chest. He wrapped his arms around her tightly.

They stayed there for a few quiet moments, until the sound of a car’s tires rolling to a stop outside came through the door.

“Three months,” Jemma said, pulling back. There were no tears on her face, just fierce determination. “I think I can do that. We’ll try.”

He cupped her face in his hands and ran his thumbs ever so lightly on her cheekbones. His hands looked so rough and grotesque next to her smooth skin. _Mismatched_ , that voice in his head hissed.

“We’ll try.”


	4. various

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “We’ve got hours,” Morse said with a smirk. “You’re in my house, Ward. Pay me in gossip.”

_ Location Classified, 2008 _

Grant had to fight to keep from showing a visible reaction when the mission overview was projected on the screen.

“All right, rookie,” Harris bellowed, even though they were the only two people in the room and Grant was sitting right in front of her. “Smuggling mission. Agent Morse has obtained a copy of a coded scientific notebook from a scientist suspected of conducting human cloning experiments. We have a SHIELD scientist in Ukraine currently who can appraise its contents when you decode it—Dr. Simmons. You’ll be dropped near the border of Jordan at night by a single truck, and it’ll be up to you to make it to Morse’s drop site in Ba’ir. She’ll get in touch with you when you reach the city. You get the documents, get to Israel, fly to Ukraine, and hand the documents to the doctor personally. Any questions?”

“No, ma’am.”

She squinted at him. “You’re one of John’s boys?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

She nodded decisively. “You’ll be all right. Don’t get cocky, don’t try anything fancy; get in, get out, and whatever you do, don’t mess anything up for Morse.”

 

…

 

Ba’ir wasn’t an easy city to get to, especially when you looked so clearly an outsider like Grant, but he bribed his way through to the drop spot Morse had set up. The thing was, when he got there, there were already people speaking. People who didn’t sound like Agent Barbara Morse.

He ducked just outside the doorway to the open room, some kind of abandoned penthouse.

“—incompetence of my men. And imagine when we discovered that you were a woman! But I assure you, this time you will not—”

“Shattley, cut the crap,” a clear female voice rang out. She sounded bored. “Your ego is bruised, fine, but you and your goons need to get out. Your boss and I have already settled everything.”

“Shut up! You’re being very rude despite the fact that you are the only person without a gun here.”

Grant had a gun. But he was also fairly sure this woman wouldn’t need it, if she was the Barbara Morse that everyone at Sci-Tech talked about.

He tried to scan the room. Morse was in the center, surrounded by men all indeed holding guns. Kind of a dumb move, considering their rifles were not suited for the close range they were in. And Morse was much too experienced an agent to be intimidated by the mere sight of guns.

Morse laughed harshly. “You think I need a gun?”

“I think you ought to—”

Morse dropped like a stone and swept the legs out from under the speaker. The two men who had been holding her collided in their haste to get her, and she flipped over them. Grabbing one as a shield in front of her, she advanced towards the other guards, who were still holding their uncocked rifles.

It worked for a little bit, Morse taking out a handful of guards, but there were enough that some got around her sides and threatened to attack her exposed fronts.

That’s where Grant could help.

He was able to get a couple shots from the doorway before the guards caught on and a couple returned bullets. He waited until one wandered close before grabbing him, hitting him hard enough to daze, and throwing him into the line of the other guards shooting at him.

Morse quickly adapted to his support, and they divide-and-conquered the remaining guards.

One of the men, however, was able to flee the room. He jumped to the rooftop of the neighboring building and started running.

“Follow me!” Morse called to Grant, leaping from the open window.

There were only a few times in his career that Grant had felt like he was in an action movie, but this was definitely up there. He and Morse chased down the last man over the rooftops of the city, jumping from building to building, climbing window ledges, and dodging the various chimneys and satellite dishes on the roofs themselves.

Finally the man swung down to a warehouse and ran inside. Morse motioned for Grant to slow down and stay low.

“He has something of mine,” she said lowly to Grant. “I want it back.”

The warehouse was dark, since it was the middle of the night, but Grant could sense things moving and people talking, too far for him to hear.

“How many bullets?” she asked.

“Four,” he whispered back. He had been counting in his head. He didn’t have more ammo, but it would have been dumb to try to run on the rooftops with one of the rifles.

“Got anything else? Knives?”

He passed her two of his generic ones. He had plenty more.

“We need some way to light this place up,” she said, looking around in the dark interior.

“Fire?” Grant offered, holding up his lighter.

Morse’s answering grin was terrifying.

 

…

 

They quickly set up little fires to burn the wooden warehouse down from the outside. Around the warehouse was a bunch of industrial waste, most of which was good for building a quick blaze.

Once the foundation was set and doused with gas, Grant lit the fuse and they sprinted around to the other side of the warehouse.

When the fire had climbed enough and the inhabitants were facing it with their backs to them, Grant and Morse attacked.

As much as Grant was touted as an effective sniper and a crack shot, he really did enjoy the physicality of a knife fight. He used his four bullets to incapacitate twice as many opponents, then switched to knives. The goons, though vastly outnumbering them, didn’t seem to realize that their guns wouldn’t help them in a close combat fight where they had a higher chance of hitting one of their own.

He and Morse moved through the bodies until they were all on the ground in various states of pain or had fled.

Morse grabbed what looked like two golden cylinders off of a table in the warehouse.

They surveyed the scene for a moment, the flames reaching the top of the ceiling and beginning to spread to the roof.

“Thanks,” she said, breathing heavily.

“No problem,” he replied, trying to not pant too obviously.

“Ward, right? Garrett’s little prodigy?”

He fought to hide his shock at that.

“I don’t know about—”

“Oh, give it up. We all heard about some kid out of nowhere putting up the best scores in the history of the Academy. Only a matter of time before you got into the rotation.”

She rolled out her shoulders and cracked her neck. “If we hadn’t literally just brought knives to a gun fight, I’d spar with you to see if you’re really that good.”

Grant smirked. “Well, considering the situation I got you out of…”

She pointed a finger at him. “Shut up.”

They made their way out of the warehouse. The street was abandoned, so it was fairly quiet, even with the building burning down behind them.

“You talk like you weren’t a sensation at the Academy too,” Grant said.

She rolled her eyes. “They were just shocked that I had gotten a doctorate but still kicked their asses.”

“It’s not very often Melinda May recommends a student for the fast-track,” Grant commented lightly.

Morse shrugged. “Yeah, you’re right...I’m probably better than you.”

She bumped Grant a little as they walked to tell him she was kidding (but only kind of).

“I have a contact who can get you across the border to Israel, but he won’t be around until tomorrow. What do you say we have a little knife-throwing game?” She held up three knives in one hand.

Grant shrugged. “Get ready to lose.”

 

…

 

“Why haven’t you tried to hit on me?” Morse asked, much later, as they lounged on her couch at an ungodly hour. They couldn’t remember whose turn it was to throw, so they just hadn’t for a little while.

Grant shifted to look at her.

“I mean, we’re like the same age. We had an adrenaline rush from the fight.”

She leaned over to look at his face.

“Just not attracted?”

Grant put a hand up behind his head. “Not really a casual hook-up type of guy.”

“Never thought I’d hear that from one of Garrett’s students,” Morse scoffed. She muttered something under her breath about misogynistic pigs.

“Are you—oh my God, you’re in a relationship!”

“What, no—how—”

“Ward, that’s crazy! All the other specialists I’ve worked with are the ‘Love is poison! Intimacy is the root of all evil!’ type of jaded. It’s kind of sad, actually.”

Grant sighed and looked at the clock.

“We’ve got hours,” Morse said with a smirk. “You’re in my house, Ward. Pay me in gossip.”

“I might...but you have to tell me yours too.”

She laughed. “My gossip? What, like how the man across the street is sleeping with his girlfriend and her brother?”

“No,” he shot back. “Like the person who kept you from joining the love-is-poison camp.”

She folded her arms across her chest. They looked at each other, unblinking.

“You drive a tough bargain, rookie.”

She told him a vague story that might have been about her seducing another agent and unknowingly falling for him, hidden under a lot of tangents and metaphors about the cheese-making process.

“That’s tough, Morse,” he finally said.

“Ugh, call me Bobbi,” she said. “Makes me feel like I’m stuck in a room with all the older agents who haven’t been called by their first names in decades. Besides, you know about...my Pecorino Romano situation.”

Grant hummed. He had never been very good at making friends, but she sounded lonely, and even if she was lying to him, they would probably work together in the future. It never hurt to make some connections, especially to someone who personally knew Melinda May.

“Grant.”

“Hmm?”

“My first name is Grant.”

“Oh...okay then, Grant. Tell me about this lucky person who’s got you turning to  Neufchâtel.”

“You’re losing me with this cheese thing.”

 

…

 

Once he got to Israel, things went a little better. Grant’s handler, Zhang, had sent a notification ahead of him to the airline that a high-ranking US military officer was coming aboard, so Grant was treated very well and not many questions were asked about how he had gotten into Israel in the first place. He got through a little of the decoding on the plane, but it was convoluted and technical. Most likely he and Jemma would have to sit down to work on it together. Not that he would complain.

Touching down in the Ukraine, finally, after a stop in the UK, Grant stepped out to walk briskly to a SHIELD safehouse.

As soon as he stepped through the door, he knew someone was there. Looking around, there were various things out of place that normally the handlers kept in order.

In Russian, he called out around his corner, “I’m coming out now! If you shoot, I promise there will be hell to pay.”

“Ward? That you?” the familiar gruff voice of his S.O. replied in English.

Grant cautiously walked forward to the living room, where Garrett was lounging on the couch.

“John. What are you doing here?”

Garrett gestured to the hallway, where another man was standing, gun in hand.

“This is my new specialist. Triplett, this is Ward.”

Grant shook Triplett’s hand.

“Didn’t know you guys were stopping by,” he said neutrally.

“You know me, Grant. Never been one for following the book word for word.”

Grant bit back his first and second responses. Garrett hadn’t appreciated the SHIELD processes for decades, and certainly wouldn’t have liked the idea of notifying other agents when he was going to be in a safehouse.

“How’s solo work treating you?” Garrett asked. “Heard about the little scrum in Myanmar.”

“Fine. The problem in Myanmar was that SHIELD didn’t have a good translator. Would’ve saved a lot of trouble if they had.”

Garrett made a small humming noise. “You know what they say, you want a job done right, gotta do it yourself.”

“Sure. Uh, excuse me, I have to make a call.”

He shut himself in one of the rooms as far away from Garrett as he could and pulled out a new burner. A call to SHIELD sent him to the director in Kharkiv, who transferred him to the head scientist, who finally gave the phone to Jemma.

“Hello?”

“Jem? I’m in Kharkiv.”

“Oh!” There was the sound of a door shutting and blinds falling. “Hello, darling, how was your flight?”

“It was okay. Heathrow was madness, as usual.”

“Heathrow? Why were you in—never mind. Is there a safehouse I can meet you at?”

Grant hesitated. He didn’t know why, but his instincts were screaming at him not to let Garrett too close to Jemma. He’d also been in too many life-and-death situations to not trust his gut.

“I’m not sure. The safehouse I’m at has some other agents here, so I’ll look for another one. I guess I could also just get a hotel room.”

“All right. Whatever you think is best, just let me know. My cellphone is secure.”

“All right. I’ll get you an answer soon. Bye, Jem.”

“Bye, darling.”

 

…

 

Grant settled on getting a hotel room. It was easier to pretend they were lovers seeking a room for an affair in front of the hotel staff than to explain to SHIELD why his sudden paranoia wouldn’t let his kind-of-maybe girlfriend in the same room as his former-father-figure. Emotions didn’t play well with their protocols.

But Jemma arrived safely and checked into their room (second floor, no fire escape, corner room, near the stairs).

They greeted each other with a relieved embrace.

“I’ve missed you,” she said simply. He wondered if she knew that that sentiment had never been directed at him.

“It’s been a while,” he agreed.

“You brought me something interesting?”

He laughed and pulled the papers out of his bag.

“It’s too technical for me to get through without you, but it’s entirely in code and in Arabic, which I don’t think you read unless you’ve been holding out on me.”

“Oh, darn,” Jemma said cheerfully, shrugging off her coat. “I guess we’ll work on it together. It’ll probably take a long time, though...why don’t we get more comfortable?”

“Shameless,” Grant chided, even though he was grinning. “Dr. Simmons, you are shameless.”

“Don’t pretend like it’s just me! We haven’t seen each other in weeks; I deserve to be cuddled by my boyfriend.”

“Ha, yeah...wait, boyfriend?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That’s how all of the serious discussions go in their relationship. One of them (Jemma, lbr) brings up an issue that would be like a whole argument if they were in a drama, but then they’re both just cool with each other and the relationship so they just go with it. Oh, we’re making out now? Oh, we’re dating now? Oh, you know me better than anyone else and still love me? Cool :)


	5. various

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ugh, forgive me; I apparently cannot come up with missions for Grant to save my life. Rip, Grant’s badassery. If only Grant had more dialogue about his feelings… >:-)

_New York, 2009_

It was like walking through an alien world as Grant made his way to the apartment. All the houses were lavishly decorated, with strings of lights and Christmas trees visible through windows. It was a sharp contrast to the ransacked village he had been in hours earlier.

Since the sun hadn’t set yet, Grant didn’t expect Jemma to be in the apartment. Once they found out the Grant would get time off for the holidays, Jemma had searched for labs in New York to visit and got in touch with a scientist experimenting with mind control who was happy to work over the holiday since she didn’t observe anything except for science.

The apartment had long been upgraded from the sparse storage room Grant had used it as for so long. He had started ordering furniture for it soon after seeing Jemma at the Academy, and worked piecemeal on it when he had down-time. Getting shot on a mission earlier that year had given him more than enough to finish the place to the level where he felt comfortable with Jemma staying over.

Jemma’s (and quickly becoming Grant’s) favorite part of the apartment were the massive bookshelves lining the walls of the living room. Grant had noticed that Jemma’s apartment at the Academy had stacks of books all around the already stuffed bookcase, so he had given her plenty more space in the city. It made him happy to see the shelves filling up every time he could see her here.

He had just unpacked his recent purchases on the coffee table when he heard the door unlock. Jemma made her way through the entryway to the living room.

“Hi, darling,” she said, leaning up on her toes for a kiss.

“Hi, sweetheart.”

Kissing Jemma after a long time away always felt like a sip of water after a workout, like he had forgotten briefly that his body needed it.

“Is that…”

“Happy Hanukkah.” Grant picked up the menorah he had bought.

She gave him another kiss, and put down her bag.

“My parents sent over one too, but it’s quite ugly. We can just steal the candles for this one.”

Grant passed her the menorah. He had been searching for one and ended up in Israel with Bobbi, who had picked it up from an abandoned pile of stuff because it was shiny. He had gotten it repaired and cleaned, and carefully brought it himself to New York.

“Thank you, darling,” she murmured, running her fingers over the menorah.

“Of course.”

Because Grant was a good boyfriend (“my favorite boyfriend in this city,” Jemma joked) with no selfish motives, he had also bought the ingredients for latkes and sufganiyot, which the Internet had told him were traditional Hanukkah foods. Jemma had raved about her mother’s latke recipe, which Grant was dying to try, but hadn’t mentioned sufganiyot before….

…

There turned out to be a reason for that.

Jemma groaned into her hands. They were sitting on the fire escape with all the windows in the apartment open to get out the bit of smoke, but more importantly the smell from their failed sufganiyot.

“It’s my family’s curse,” Jemma said bitterly, taking a fierce bite of the cheese they had brought out with them. “Fantastic latkes but abysmal sufganiyot.”

“I’m just impressed we got something made mostly of water to burn,” Grant commented, taking a sip of his wine. It was a bit unfortunate about the doughnuts, and also the kitchen, but he was honestly just happy to have Jemma next to him. There was something _them_ and romantic—he knew Garrett was suddenly repulsed somewhere without knowing why—about sitting on the fire escape, drinking wine and eating cheese, snuggled in blankets.

“We ought to light the menorah,” Jemma said. Neither of them moved.

“I have a Hanukkah gift for you,” Grant said. He was trying to convince his body to move indoors, but it didn’t want to obey him.

“Darling, you bringing all this for me is a gift in itself,” she said, looking up at him affectionately. “I doubt I’ll be able to return the favor for Christmas.”

He laughed. “That won’t be a problem.”

Jemma made an inquisitive sound.

“I...I’m not the biggest fan of Christmas.”

She tucked her head closer to him with a sigh. One thing Grant loved about Jemma was that she didn’t pry into his past. She let him decide what to tell her, which ended up being most things, but right now he wanted to keep the mood comfortable.

“Maybe it’ll be different with you.”

“I hope so. I’ll bet you’ve never had Chinese food on Christmas.”

“You would be right about that.”

“See? And then, we can bake cookies. Far more cooperative than those bloody doughnuts.”

He grinned and pressed a kiss into her hair.

“I love you.”

“I love you too, darling.”

 

…

 

_Switzerland, 2010_

When Grant strolled into the offices above the cafe, he was the picture of casual. He definitely didn’t match the chaos in front of him.

SHIELD agents, alongside other security agencies and the police, were all talking to each other or on the phone, and flitting back and forth around the room.

“Ward,” someone called.

He turned to see his handler, Zhang, waving him over to the corner. It was impossible to miss the imposing figures around her; other specialists most likely.

“Zhang.” He shook her hand.

“Sorry to have called you in on such short notice; I know the Markov interrogation is ongoing. I wanted a sniper I knew could get this job done.”

Turning to the rest of the people waiting for her, she said louder, “All right, y’all. Here’s the sitch. There are six international ambassadors and their aides in that building across the street and approximately fifteen armed rebels holding them for ransom. The ransom they’re asking for is mass resignation and immunity, so we’re going to have to break them out. We’re fairly sure they have bombs rigged, but we don’t know where or how many. The countries involved have requested that we keep this quiet. That means basically no military presence with you.”

She motioned them closer.

“I know. It’s ignorant of them to ask you to do this with so little support, but they couldn’t even get the initial security right. Here’s my plan…”

…

Grant swiftly made his way up to the perch he had picked out, and unpacked the gun SHIELD had provided. He had to wait for the signal, but he wanted to be ready just in case.

The four specialists working this job were himself, Bobbi, Triplett, and Agent 33. He had only ever worked with Bobbi, but he knew that Agent 33 must have crossed paths with her before. They had introduced themselves to each other while packing up to move.

“Feels like we should do a team cheer or something,” Bobbi had said dryly.

Grant appreciated her trying to cut the tension, but didn’t speak. Trip gave a little “go team.” Kara grunted, “Just don’t die out there.”

From his vantage point, Grant could see their plan unfold and hopefully see problems before they got anybody killed.

Bobbi and Trip were moving along in the first stage of the plan, which was to make sure the hostages were all safe, but also get a SHIELD presence inside. Both agents had medical training and the online backgrounds to prove it, and thankfully the rebels wanted to show their compassion by allowing two medical personnel in.

Grant could see them as they made their way inside with large boxes of first aid supplies, which were scanned using the building’s security system—not that that had stopped the rebels from taking over in the first place.

The building wasn’t the most ideal for outside visibility, particularly that of a sniper, but Grant had made a living out of making the impossible shots. He watched until Bobbi and Trip reached the part of the building he couldn’t see, some kind of basement or lower level.

Over the comms, Bobbi’s voice came as she presumably checked the hostages.

“Hi there. I’m Sarah. I’m here to help. Can I see your arm?”

There was a pause where the patient moved to comply.

“Okay. Let’s see. Looks all right from the outside, but I think I feel a tendon or something right here where it shouldn’t be. Let me see if I can get that fixed. I bet it hurts, right? Like you got a piece of shrapnel or something dug in there.”

That was code. Grant scanned the building to see if he could tell what she was talking about. Shrapnel...that probably was referring to the bombs Zhang had predicted.

_There!_ Over at the back end of the building, where the coffee shop couldn’t see, a man was walking around stopping every few feet to closely inspect the wall. The bomb charges?

Grant brought out his binoculars. On the exterior of the building there were indeed bombs. A lot of them.

“I’ve got eyes on the bombs,” he said into the comm. “I count four on this side, probably continuing around the back to the other side. They’re connected by wire, no countdown. Must be a detonator inside.”

“Surveillance counts eight bombs total. Possibly more not visible,” Kara added. She had stayed in the coffee shop to run negotiation.

“Hmm,” Bobbi responded, under the guise of talking to a patient. “May I? Yeah, right here, up by your neck, is probably what’s causing the trouble. Sometimes the source of the problem isn’t always right next to where you feel the pain.”

The neck...she must have meant the security station, the bottleneck of the entryway, or just somewhere close to there. The lead rebel wouldn’t conduct negotiations in front of the hostages, so close to the bombs.

“Can’t get a good angle on the security station,” Grant said.

“Done with your half?” Trip asked Bobbi.

“Yep. All accounted for. Some injuries, mostly bruising and sprains. Good thing they won’t have to run any time soon.”

So sneaking out likely wouldn’t work. The only option was to completely neutralize the threat.

“Yeah, I’m running low on supplies too. I only have thirteen of the big bandages left,” Trip continued.

Thirteen guards. Which meant the majority of them were in sight of the hostages, and thus only a few were left in the security station.

“Ward, what if I get the leader to move to the entryway?” Kara asked. “Just before the metal detectors.”

“Yeah, I can make that.”

“Okay. I’ll get them there, you take him down, and then we all move. Trip and Bobbi take out the guards, and move the hostages through the side passages.”

“The bombs?” Grant asked.

She hesitated. “Can you disable them? They should only explode if one of the rebels hits the detonator, but it would be one less thing to worry about.”

“Copy that. On my way down.”

The bombs weren’t terribly sophisticated, but they were powerful. All Grant had to do was very, very carefully unplug certain tiny wires and remove the one responsible for passing along the signal. They were all in series, so breaking one in the chain should stop the following ones, but Grant removed them all, just to be safe. If there were other bombs, they would have to be on a different detonator. They just had to pray that the leader valued the thirteen guards with the hostages and hadn’t planted more explosives.

Kara had been talking to the lead rebel the entire time he was working.

“—and that’s when they shot my whole family,” he heard her say.

They obviously didn’t talk about it, but it was pretty common for specialists to come from brutal backgrounds. As far as Grant knew, Kara was telling the truth, which was an interesting choice considering she was on comms and surrounded by other agents. Then again, it was always smarter to go as close to the truth as possible when facing ideological maniacs with hostages and bombs.

“That’s terrible. I’m sorry. But yet you still work for the capitalist pigs who caused it,” the rebel replied.

“I do, but it’s better than kidnapping ambassadors.”

“Please. I only do this because the world citizens need to know their voices are being heard. I’m just like you or any other person wronged by this system, but I have a plan and the will to execute it.”

“You’ve made your point. The ambassadors are terrified. People and news agencies from all over the world are hearing about this situation. But if you hurt them, you’ll just look like a monster.”

“Maybe that’s what’s needed,” the rebel snarled.

Grant quickly brought his gun up to sight at that. If the ambassadors were at all in danger, SHIELD would have to use lethal force.

“You think words will do anything? We’ve been fighting using words for centuries. That didn’t stop our lands and rights being stripped from us. Our dignity…”

“See, that’s just it! If they could see your face, they could see your dignity.” Kara skillfully made her tone beseeching, a little desperately naive.

The rebel paused curiously. “What are you proposing?”

“I have a camera, on my helmet. It’s for police records. The footage will go back to the police and they will spread it all over the world. And it’s only me. There would be no one else.”

“33,” Grant warned.

She pressed on. “All you have to do is meet me at the doors. I won’t go in, you don’t have to come out. Let the world see you.”

“You make some good points, Madame Policewoman. I accept, but I warn you that any attempts to deviate from this plan or trick me, I will make the ambassadors sorely regret it.”

“Deal.”

Just before Kara exited the coffeeshop, she spoke one more time. “Ward, as soon as you get the shot, get on comms so the inside team knows.”

“Copy that.”

In plain view of the building, she walked out with her hands up. She stopped in the middle to take off her headset and toss it to the side. The helmet with the camera was her only piece of equipment aside from a police windbreaker.

She approached the door. Grant saw movement in the entryway. Almost...almost...a little closer…

_There_.

“I have the shot. On my mark,” he said. The air felt dead still all around him, all the way between him and the faint outline of a person aiming a gun at 33. 33, who had her hands up and no way to defend herself if he missed.

_Deep breath in…_

“Three.”

_Hold…_

“Two.”

_And out…_

“One.”

_CRACK._

Dead on. Grant watched the body fall from the scope, then swung the gun around to the next window he could see through.

Kara was a blur, fighting her way through the entryway. Grant tried to help her by shooting down the trickle of rebels rushing down the hallway.

Bobbi and Trip had turned on their comms, and Grant could hear sounds of them fighting the guards.

Once Kara reached beyond where Grant could see, he swiftly packed up the rifle and headed down to the street level.

No one was relaying anything on comms besides grunts or “look out!” from Trip or Bobbi.

Finally, after leaping down the flights of stairs, Grant made it to the front of the occupied building. The bombs hadn’t gone off, so at least that had worked.

When he reached the doors, Trip was herding the ambassadors out.

“Almost clear,” he called to Grant.

They worked together to sit the ambassadors down in the coffee shop, where the personnel from all of the agencies swarmed on them.

Grant and Trip extricated themselves from the madness to help Bobbi and Kara, who reported they were clear.

The four worked almost entirely in silence, other than, “Hey, could you pass me some SHIELD cuffs?” Even so, Grant was thinking, it was almost like a bonding exercise to carry unconscious mercenaries they had just neutralized the length of a government building.

Trip and Bobbi had gotten all of the guards immediately in their vicinity, and most of the other ones had run towards the gunshots where Kara and Grant were picking off the rest. It was over in a matter of minutes thanks to the confusion of cutting off the leader and the threat of the bombs.

He and Bobbi collected the bombs from the side of the building. At one point, he had to stop her from detonating one of them by pulling it too hard from the wall without releasing the tab.

“Just testing you,” Bobbi joked tiredly.

Eventually they got them all boxed away.

“Good job on the bombs, Ward,” 33 said to him as they waited for the SHIELD van to come for the rebels.

“Good job on the negotiation. You got some nerve, 33.”

They shook hands.

“Word around the Triskelion is you saved the op in Myanmar. Glad you’re living up to your shooting scores,” was her parting shot.

“...Thanks.”

 

…

 

Zhang greeted them all warmly when they got back to the office over the coffeeshop. The other agencies had all but packed up, leaving no trace of the international disaster that could have occurred.

“Great work, guys. The higher-ups are impressed.”

She distributed important-looking dossiers to each specialist.

“What they didn’t want me to tell you guys was that this was a test run for a new team. The directors came up with a list of candidates for a new group of specialists they’re forming, and you guys are it. These folders have information about the program and your team, and I’m also here for any other questions. Again, good job, y’all.”

Grant opened the folder, not knowing what to expect.

The first page read in large letters:

Mobile Independent Specialist Team (M.I.S.T.), proposed part of the Assistance for the Protection and Organization of Covert Advancement (A.P.O.C.A.).

“APOCA, like apocalypse.” Trip commented.

Zhang nodded. “Yep, that’s the one. You know how SHIELD gets about these acronyms.”

“And we would be what? Their muscle?” Kara asked dryly.

“Oh, no. You would be much more autonomous than that. You wouldn’t be used _by_ APOC, you would be a team under their umbrella, so your cases will involve a lot of undercover operations and smuggling missions. I understand that STRIKE had some interest in you four, but they deal with problems when they arrive and punch us in the gut. APOC wants to run constant interference so these problems change too quickly to do that.”

“Are these solo missions? We’re all specialists, individual workers,” Grant said, crossing his arms.

“They hope that you four can learn to work as a team. You’re all fairly young, and while you’re all great agents, as a group you would be remarkably powerful. All your weaknesses are more than covered by your teammates’ strengths.”

“Weaknesses,” Bobbi echoed teasingly.

“Not my words, Morse,” Zhang held up her hands.

She sobered up again. “You have a week to think about it. Read through the dossiers, shoot me an email for questions. I hope to see you all very soon.”

She headed for the doorway.

“Wait,” Bobbi called. “Do we get a cool name? MIST doesn’t really have a ring to it like Strike Team Delta.”

Zhang turned back to face them. “Oh, right. They wanted me to push this as a selling point; SHIELD directors are thinking of calling you the Horsemen, you know, like the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. Kind of clever, right?”

 

…

 

Grant avoided Bobbi’s attempts to get in touch with them. After their bonding in Ba’ir, they had worked together on various occasions, usually in the Middle East. Bobbi was probably his closest friend, a distant second after Jemma.

Then again, giving her ways to contact him and annoy him was possibly a mistake.

He should have known she wouldn’t leave him alone. The day he finished the Markov interrogation, she was waiting in the lobby.

“How did you—fine, we can talk.”

“That’s all I wanted,” she snarked, but walked next to him.

“This opportunity with APOC...pretty sweet, isn’t it?”

Grant shrugged.

“A chance to get out of the rotation, plan our own missions, get our own plane…”

“Look, Morse, I’m flattered, but I prefer to work alone. Always have.”

She narrowed her eyes at him. “So you’re just going to give up this opportunity? Ward, you know founding a team is, like, the best way to make your mark as an agent. You’re not just some glorified merc following around Zhang for the rest of your career.”

“Why do you care what I do?”

“Are you really going to make me answer that?”

He stopped walking. “Well, I’d like to know, because last time I checked, you don’t need me to join this team.”

“I’m worried about you throwing away this chance to not be like Garrett, staying in the rotation until you’re old and bitter and prejudiced—”

“What the hell is this, Morse? You think I can’t take care of myself? You think you know what I need more than I do?!”

“I think you’re being an ass!”

“Oh, for Christ’s sake,” he muttered, turning and walking away.

She followed after him.

“Hey, robot-man! I’m talking to you.”

He kept walking, not going anywhere in particular.

Finally she ran in front of him. “I have a secure room back there. Let’s just talk about this.”

“Will you finally leave me alone if I do?”

Rather than answering, she started back towards the motel they had just passed. He sighed, closed his eyes to gather himself, and followed.

As soon as he walked in after her, she slammed the door and whirled to face him.

“What’s your problem?”

“What’s _your_ problem?”

“Why do you keep shutting me out?”

“Why won’t you leave me alone?!”

“Come on, Grant,” she said in frustration. “I could read you the second you stepped into that room back in Ba’ir. You’ve had to prove yourself to the world from the moment you opened your eyes. You’re always trying to be better, stronger, faster, smarter, _less vulnerable_ . But you’re also a human being. You have breakable bones and feelings and the need to be loved. And you keep pushing people away because you think this need makes you weak. It doesn’t, Grant. You’re a good person and a _great_ agent. You can’t be afraid of your emotions. If you didn’t love Simmons, if you didn’t love people, why would you fight for them? Why would you risk your life for mine?”

The room was dead quiet when she took a breath. She continued in a softer voice.

“Love isn’t poison. Simmons has been so great for you, and I think you know that, but there’s room in your life for more. I promise. It doesn’t make you less of a man, or less of a fighter.

“You’re a good guy. So is Trip, so is Kara. I wouldn’t want to be part of a team with people I didn’t trust. You’ll have our backs, and we’ll have yours. You just have to let us.”

Shoulders releasing their tension, Grant could only pull her into a hug. The only person he had hugged in a decade was Simmons. It was just dawning on him how sad that was.

They stayed like that for probably too long, but Grant wasn’t about to let go. Bobbi was damn good at reading people. Sometimes people just needed their fears brought out into the open and just obliterated by a friend. Someone who cared about them.

“Of course, Bob,” he roughly answered, minutes later.

She pulled back and wiped her eyes.

“Whew. That was a lot.”

“Yeah. Thank you. I...You were right.”

“I know. Wanna go punch something?”

“God, yes.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>   
>  (by teenagerposts.tumblr.com)  
>   
> (by concerningwolves.tumblr.com)  
> get rekt Grant Douglas Ward


End file.
